WEBVTT - From the Vault: Transhumanist Rapture War, Part 2 0:00:06.080 --> 0:00:07.880 Hey, you welcome to stuff to blow your mind. My 0:00:07.960 --> 0:00:10.920 name is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick, and it's Saturday. 0:00:10.920 --> 0:00:13.480 It's time to go into that vault. So we're gonna 0:00:13.520 --> 0:00:16.239 be airing part two of the Vault episode that we 0:00:16.280 --> 0:00:19.440 started with last Saturday. Isn't that right? That's right? This 0:00:19.440 --> 0:00:24.960 one originally published August, the trans Humanist Rapture War Part two, 0:00:25.600 --> 0:00:30.200 which again was a discussion of various trans human utopian 0:00:30.320 --> 0:00:35.879 ideas um in light of various religious ideas about like 0:00:35.920 --> 0:00:39.839 a post Earth utopia. Now, I think the religious aspects 0:00:39.840 --> 0:00:44.120 of techno utopianism and techno dystopianism are are both actually 0:00:44.280 --> 0:00:49.239 fascinating and sort of uhh, endless the bottomless wells right 0:00:49.320 --> 0:00:52.760 that you can always come back to. I think we 0:00:52.840 --> 0:00:56.080 will revisit this topic again soon. Yeah, though though I 0:00:56.080 --> 0:00:58.880 don't know if we'll discuss my my concept of a 0:00:59.200 --> 0:01:03.360 rapture proof suit any further. This may be the only 0:01:03.400 --> 0:01:05.520 place that idea I gets still. No, that is a 0:01:05.560 --> 0:01:07.319 whole thing that I was gonna say, would do a 0:01:07.360 --> 0:01:09.440 whole episode on that, But in fact, what you should 0:01:09.480 --> 0:01:12.800 just do is keep that idea to yourself and get 0:01:12.920 --> 0:01:17.200 some venture capital behind it. Well, uh yeah, maybe we 0:01:17.200 --> 0:01:19.119 can make that happen. But for now, let's suit up 0:01:19.160 --> 0:01:25.440 and head in. Welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind 0:01:25.640 --> 0:01:36.000 from how Stuff Works dot com. Hey, welcome to Stuff 0:01:36.000 --> 0:01:38.040 to Blow your mind. My name is Robert Lamb, and 0:01:38.080 --> 0:01:41.000 I'm Joe McCormick and Robert and I. Last time, we're 0:01:41.040 --> 0:01:47.319 talking about the rapture about Christian eschatology, religious eschatology in general, 0:01:47.360 --> 0:01:51.000 and secular eschatology of a technological nature such as the 0:01:51.040 --> 0:01:55.120 singularity trans humanism. And our discussion went so long that 0:01:55.160 --> 0:01:58.040 we decided to divide it up into two parts. So 0:01:58.320 --> 0:02:01.400 here is the second part of our conversation on the 0:02:01.560 --> 0:02:07.760 end times. Okay, well, I've got another uh futurist, sort 0:02:07.800 --> 0:02:10.760 of techno futurist mindset that I think we can ask. 0:02:11.040 --> 0:02:13.480 Is this a religion? Is it like a religion or 0:02:13.520 --> 0:02:16.160 does it just sort of like uh tickle some of 0:02:16.160 --> 0:02:19.280 the same weak spots. We've got as many religions too. 0:02:19.320 --> 0:02:24.200 So I want to talk about the singularity. Robert, do 0:02:24.240 --> 0:02:26.600 you feel good about the Singularity? You feel bad about it, 0:02:26.639 --> 0:02:28.760 you think it's a bunch of hooey? I feel good 0:02:28.800 --> 0:02:31.000 about it. Uh, I mean part of that I think 0:02:31.040 --> 0:02:33.840 comes from just being I'm a fan of like the 0:02:33.840 --> 0:02:37.200 A and M. Banks culture series model of of a 0:02:37.280 --> 0:02:40.760 post singularity, post scarcity world in which the super intelligent 0:02:40.840 --> 0:02:44.360 computers have our best interests at heart. They kind of 0:02:44.360 --> 0:02:50.560 look after us as kind of benevolent, semi noble gods. Yeah, okay, okay, Well, 0:02:50.639 --> 0:02:52.960 so I think we need to explore this idea because this, 0:02:53.040 --> 0:02:55.440 to me is is the core of this kind of 0:02:55.639 --> 0:02:59.560 topic we're talking about today, like technological eschatology. So you 0:02:59.560 --> 0:03:02.040 could say the singularity, I think has come to have 0:03:02.080 --> 0:03:05.480 almost as many interpretations as the Christian escoton right, Like, 0:03:05.720 --> 0:03:08.919 just like the Christian eschatologies, they're all sort of loosely 0:03:09.040 --> 0:03:12.320 related and grounded in similar beliefs, but they vary in 0:03:12.400 --> 0:03:15.440 the explicit details or in the way you'd explain them, 0:03:15.480 --> 0:03:19.760 even if they're not necessarily contradictory. So, in the most 0:03:19.760 --> 0:03:25.160 basic sense, the singularity is a hypothesis that technological innovation, 0:03:25.400 --> 0:03:27.600 at some point in the future is going to reach 0:03:27.639 --> 0:03:32.840 a tipping point of unimaginable innovation that fundamentally changes the 0:03:32.880 --> 0:03:36.760 fate of humanity on a rapid time scale. Very often 0:03:36.800 --> 0:03:41.120 it involves artificial intelligence. So I'm gonna talk about three 0:03:41.120 --> 0:03:43.280 basic models just to give you an idea. One one 0:03:43.360 --> 0:03:46.240 is the super intelligence model, and this is the idea 0:03:46.360 --> 0:03:51.320 that humans are going to create superhuman artificial intelligence. So 0:03:51.320 --> 0:03:54.440 when you think about it, intelligence, I would probably agree 0:03:54.480 --> 0:03:57.600 has been the most rapid driver of change in the 0:03:57.760 --> 0:04:02.360 universe up until this point in cosmological or geological history. 0:04:02.440 --> 0:04:05.920 What difference does ten thousand years usually make to anything, 0:04:06.800 --> 0:04:09.680 you know, not a lot, hardly any, But you think 0:04:09.680 --> 0:04:12.280 about how much Earth has changed in the past ten 0:04:12.320 --> 0:04:16.440 thousand years due to intelligence. Once, once we reach the 0:04:16.520 --> 0:04:20.800 creation of machines with functional intelligence exceeding that of any human, 0:04:20.839 --> 0:04:25.200 assuming that actually does happen, proponents argue that this superhuman 0:04:25.279 --> 0:04:28.960 artificial intelligence is just going to rapidly transform our environment. 0:04:29.560 --> 0:04:32.360 The conditions of our lives, and the capabilities of human 0:04:32.400 --> 0:04:37.039 civilization will be fundamentally transformed on a very huge scale. 0:04:37.560 --> 0:04:40.480 And they say, so the age of super intelligence is dawning, 0:04:40.520 --> 0:04:44.200 and this is the singularity. Another way of looking at 0:04:44.240 --> 0:04:48.040 it is also based on artificial intelligence, but it's known 0:04:48.080 --> 0:04:50.680 as the intelligence explosion, and this is based on the 0:04:50.720 --> 0:04:56.200 idea of self improving intelligence paradigms that surpass our ability 0:04:56.640 --> 0:04:59.560 to understand or control them. So let's say, Robert, you 0:04:59.600 --> 0:05:03.120 build a superhuman artificial intelligence. What's the first thing you 0:05:03.120 --> 0:05:06.839 have it? Do? UM? Co author my paper about the 0:05:06.920 --> 0:05:11.640 creation superhero human AI intelligence. Oh yeah, well that's that's 0:05:11.680 --> 0:05:14.720 a smart move. But do some talk shows to promote 0:05:14.920 --> 0:05:19.400 it in my book about the creation? Yeah? I guess yeah. 0:05:19.400 --> 0:05:20.960 It's hard to think past that, right, come up with 0:05:21.000 --> 0:05:24.279 the tastiest breakfast cereal ever created? No? I mean what 0:05:24.440 --> 0:05:26.160 a lot of people say is, well, you know, the 0:05:26.160 --> 0:05:29.080 best bang for your buck as soon as you create 0:05:29.279 --> 0:05:32.920 a superhuman artificial intelligence is that it would be best 0:05:32.960 --> 0:05:36.680 put to use designing ways to rapidly make itself more intelligent, 0:05:36.800 --> 0:05:39.920 which theoretically it should be able to do. So if 0:05:39.920 --> 0:05:44.320 it can do this, it will experience exponential self improvement. 0:05:44.400 --> 0:05:48.000 And not only will our technological intelligence grow, and not 0:05:48.120 --> 0:05:51.960 only will it accelerate, but it's acceleration will accelerate. I 0:05:51.960 --> 0:05:54.200 feel like the people saying that that's the best use 0:05:54.520 --> 0:05:59.039 of super intelligence UM have not seen any science fiction film, 0:05:59.120 --> 0:06:01.040 because it seems like the thing to do is all right. 0:06:01.120 --> 0:06:03.600 It's it's reached the point to where it's smart enough 0:06:04.200 --> 0:06:06.320 that I can take it to Vegas and and just 0:06:06.400 --> 0:06:10.039 totally kill but it's not so smart that it will 0:06:10.080 --> 0:06:14.800 literally kill me, or or skying at the entire country. Well, 0:06:14.880 --> 0:06:16.520 I don't know. I mean I think the argument would 0:06:16.520 --> 0:06:18.720 go that, well, even if you don't do that, somebody's 0:06:18.760 --> 0:06:21.080 gonna somebody's gonna say, well, I want to have a 0:06:21.120 --> 0:06:23.479 smarter AI than your AI, so I'm gonna have my 0:06:23.560 --> 0:06:28.560 AI improve itself that I don't know. You take your 0:06:28.600 --> 0:06:31.000 AI to a poker game and somebody else has been 0:06:31.080 --> 0:06:35.159 having their AI self improve its own intelligence, and it's 0:06:35.200 --> 0:06:38.599 telling that person out this metaphors out of hand. But 0:06:39.400 --> 0:06:41.320 but you want to be the person with the smartest day. 0:06:41.360 --> 0:06:43.680 I right, Well, but it's kind of like you're you're 0:06:43.680 --> 0:06:46.640 reaching a point where you can create your own demons, 0:06:46.760 --> 0:06:50.479 create your own deities, and in doing so, it seems 0:06:50.520 --> 0:06:53.240 like you you need to know where to stop, like 0:06:53.240 --> 0:06:56.800 like maybe not make a full blown god, that make 0:06:56.839 --> 0:06:59.000 a demi god. Let me make an artificial demi god, 0:06:59.040 --> 0:07:02.080 because then it literally it has limits. Right, Yeah, you 0:07:02.120 --> 0:07:05.080 want a Hercules not a Zeus. Yeah, I'd far rather 0:07:05.160 --> 0:07:08.440 deal with a renegade or Hercules this in a situation 0:07:08.480 --> 0:07:11.600 as opposed to renegades, which of course is I mean, 0:07:11.640 --> 0:07:14.600 it's pretty much how both of those guys rolled what 0:07:14.640 --> 0:07:17.200 they wanted. Okay, one more idea of the singularity, and 0:07:17.240 --> 0:07:20.000 this is a I think a simpler version, but it 0:07:20.080 --> 0:07:23.480 just says that at some point technological process again, usually 0:07:23.480 --> 0:07:26.040 the emphasis is on artificial intelligence, but you could put 0:07:26.040 --> 0:07:29.640 the emphasis elsewhere. At some point it begins to accelerate 0:07:29.720 --> 0:07:32.560 so quickly that our power to predict the outcome becomes 0:07:32.560 --> 0:07:36.800 basically zero. Events will become so strange and unpredictable that 0:07:36.840 --> 0:07:38.960 we we just can't even imagine them from our present 0:07:39.040 --> 0:07:43.240 vantage point. So an outside context dident. Yeah, actually, sure, 0:07:43.600 --> 0:07:48.120 outside context problem caused by technological innovation. Yeah. So a 0:07:48.200 --> 0:07:51.240 lot of modern singularity thinking can be traced, and there 0:07:51.280 --> 0:07:53.280 are plenty people who have written about this over the years, 0:07:53.280 --> 0:07:55.760 but I'd say the biggest figure in the singularity today 0:07:55.800 --> 0:07:59.960 is Ray Kerswile. He's the technologist and author. Ray Kers, 0:08:00.000 --> 0:08:03.920 while very smart guy, worked on technology for years. He's 0:08:03.920 --> 0:08:07.240 made a lot of very accurate and interesting predictions that 0:08:07.280 --> 0:08:10.840 have that have proved correct over the years. But he's 0:08:10.880 --> 0:08:13.360 also made a lot of predictions about the future that 0:08:13.400 --> 0:08:15.280 a lot of people now think are I don't know, 0:08:15.360 --> 0:08:18.720 maybe he's being overly optimistic, but anyway, curse Will has 0:08:18.840 --> 0:08:23.360 argued in several books that the Singularity, this artificial intelligence 0:08:24.200 --> 0:08:28.080 revolution that's going to fundamentally change humanity, is coming, and 0:08:28.160 --> 0:08:31.600 it's coming soon. In his two thousand five book The 0:08:31.640 --> 0:08:36.839 Singularity Is Near, curse Will predicted it would happen in so, Robert, 0:08:36.840 --> 0:08:42.000 you've got any plans for um? I think my son 0:08:42.520 --> 0:08:45.520 will be out of high school at that point. I 0:08:45.559 --> 0:08:52.360 think he's he's uh graduating high school theoretically in so Okay, 0:08:53.520 --> 0:08:55.320 So I guess. So, I don't know, Well, he have 0:08:55.400 --> 0:08:58.480 a job by the time the Singularity happened. I don't know. Yeah, 0:08:58.600 --> 0:09:01.240 It's it's crazy to think about that, Like what do 0:09:01.280 --> 0:09:03.680 you what do you? What do you do post high school? 0:09:04.200 --> 0:09:07.079 If the Singularity is coming in just a few years, 0:09:07.080 --> 0:09:09.360 Like do you go to college? Hey? With with the 0:09:09.400 --> 0:09:13.080 singularity in mind? Bingo, That is a very good question. 0:09:13.120 --> 0:09:16.000 So so let's back up. Let's just assume for a 0:09:16.080 --> 0:09:20.880 moment a singularity type scaton is coming. That might be 0:09:20.920 --> 0:09:23.800 a big assumption, but let's assume something like that will happen. 0:09:24.760 --> 0:09:27.199 Is it good or bad? Will we get the AI 0:09:27.520 --> 0:09:32.680 my Trea or the AI ragnarokh Well, obviously I want 0:09:32.720 --> 0:09:35.280 my Traya as opposed to Ragnarock. Yeah, I mean, so 0:09:35.320 --> 0:09:37.840 the my Trea version, what would it be? You know, 0:09:38.120 --> 0:09:42.480 war cease, all diseases, including aging itself or eradicated. There's 0:09:42.559 --> 0:09:46.240 general abundance of resources and wealth. Everybody gets what they want. 0:09:46.360 --> 0:09:50.280 Humans live indefinitely in a state of harmony, exploration, and bliss. 0:09:51.960 --> 0:09:53.760 If I feel like the model we get in most 0:09:53.760 --> 0:09:56.360 sci fi scenarios is that you think you're gonna get 0:09:56.360 --> 0:09:59.800 my Treia, but then you're actually on the road to Ragnarok, 0:10:00.280 --> 0:10:01.880 and then you end up just kind of burning everything 0:10:01.920 --> 0:10:04.679 down and going back to whatever the nest up system 0:10:04.720 --> 0:10:07.040 you had before. Right, So why do people think that 0:10:07.120 --> 0:10:10.679 we're on the road to Ragnarok? Well, you mentioned earlier, 0:10:10.720 --> 0:10:13.080 you know, the machine, a machine smart enough to to 0:10:13.200 --> 0:10:15.319 do all this great stuff for you, is also smart 0:10:15.400 --> 0:10:17.000 enough to figure out how to kill you if it 0:10:17.080 --> 0:10:21.560 wants to. So why might it want to? Well, super 0:10:21.600 --> 0:10:25.720 intelligent machines, people say, well, either intentionally choose to eliminate 0:10:25.840 --> 0:10:29.760 humanity for some reason, though I admit I've never heard 0:10:29.760 --> 0:10:31.400 this explain in a way that made a lot of 0:10:31.440 --> 0:10:34.640 sense to me, Like why they would intentionally choose to 0:10:34.800 --> 0:10:37.720 hunt us down and eradicate us. So maybe somebody could 0:10:37.760 --> 0:10:40.520 explain that to me, Um, but the judge of the 0:10:40.559 --> 0:10:43.560 living and the dead, it could be. But but the 0:10:43.640 --> 0:10:47.560 other version is that perhaps merely by a flow of design, 0:10:47.920 --> 0:10:51.920 they tend to damage or destroy humanity as a byproduct 0:10:51.960 --> 0:10:55.800 of executing their primary function, and that that vision seems 0:10:55.840 --> 0:10:58.720 more plausible to me. But so, here's one common example 0:10:58.760 --> 0:11:01.000 of how something like this would. Oh, you've got a 0:11:01.040 --> 0:11:04.800 super intelligent computer program that's smarter than any human. It 0:11:04.840 --> 0:11:07.840 can improve its own intelligence, is just crazy smart, and 0:11:07.880 --> 0:11:11.160 it's designed to maximize efficiency along the production line of 0:11:11.160 --> 0:11:14.720 a factory that makes toilet paper. So somebody forgets to 0:11:14.760 --> 0:11:18.480 add some conditionals and the computer program ends up turning 0:11:18.480 --> 0:11:20.840 all the atoms on the surface of the earth, including 0:11:20.880 --> 0:11:24.000 the ones in your body, into toilet paper. It has 0:11:24.040 --> 0:11:27.600 done its job. Well, that sounds kind of crazy, But 0:11:27.720 --> 0:11:31.000 some tam or version of that nightmare seems more plausible 0:11:31.080 --> 0:11:35.120 to me than the intentional terminator style eradication of humans. 0:11:35.720 --> 0:11:39.240 I don't know what do you think about that, Robert Um? Yeah, 0:11:39.320 --> 0:11:42.520 I I I think I tend to interpret the sort 0:11:42.520 --> 0:11:45.840 of sky net models the sort of like all humans 0:11:45.840 --> 0:11:48.840 are flawed. That's thus all humans must be eradicated thing 0:11:48.920 --> 0:11:53.680 to be more of a uh more rejecting insecurities. Well 0:11:53.760 --> 0:11:56.320 for that and also just a bedtime story to say, 0:11:56.360 --> 0:11:59.160 like make sure you program in that fail safe, right, 0:11:59.360 --> 0:12:01.920 you know, be And I feel like obviously we would 0:12:01.920 --> 0:12:03.880 have that fail safe, and that if it were a 0:12:04.040 --> 0:12:08.520 super intelligent machine, it would have Yeah. I just have 0:12:08.559 --> 0:12:12.600 a hard time buying into that model of a super 0:12:12.640 --> 0:12:20.360 advanced system that it would be so catastrophically myopic. Yeah, yeah, 0:12:20.480 --> 0:12:23.200 I mean, both visions have their advocates right there. There 0:12:23.200 --> 0:12:26.280 are smart people on both sides. But the funny thing 0:12:26.360 --> 0:12:29.080 is all this is assuming that something like the singularity 0:12:29.120 --> 0:12:31.800 will actually happen one way or another, and not everyone 0:12:31.840 --> 0:12:35.280 agrees that it will. But there are also people who 0:12:35.280 --> 0:12:37.960 have been critical of the idea of the singularity, and 0:12:38.000 --> 0:12:42.440 some people who have characterized it as a religious idea inherently. 0:12:42.520 --> 0:12:47.320 One of them is the technologist and virtual reality pioneer 0:12:47.840 --> 0:12:51.000 Jerone Landier, and he's got a lot of opinions about 0:12:51.040 --> 0:12:54.400 the Singularity. He's made this case in in books, said 0:12:54.440 --> 0:12:57.000 that it's not only religious in nature, but potentially a 0:12:57.120 --> 0:13:01.160 dangerous or harmful religion. So I read an article that 0:13:01.200 --> 0:13:03.120 he wrote and published in The New York Times in 0:13:03.160 --> 0:13:07.560 two thousand ten called the First Church of Robotics, and 0:13:07.600 --> 0:13:10.520 I thought this was interesting. So Lanier points out that 0:13:11.720 --> 0:13:15.160 every news report of an advance in artificial intelligence gives 0:13:15.240 --> 0:13:18.239 us the impression that the field is making steady progress 0:13:18.280 --> 0:13:21.920 to overtake human intelligence and capabilities. And I sort of 0:13:21.920 --> 0:13:23.920 agree with him. I get that feeling when you see 0:13:23.960 --> 0:13:26.800 these little news stories like there's there's a new artificial 0:13:26.840 --> 0:13:31.120 intelligence program that can smell flatulence. There's a new artificial 0:13:31.120 --> 0:13:34.280 intelligence program that can tell a joke. You know, all 0:13:34.320 --> 0:13:38.319 these like weird little quirks of humanity, and they seem 0:13:38.400 --> 0:13:41.480 to add up to something over time. Okay, so it 0:13:41.480 --> 0:13:44.280 can smell farts, that can make jokes about farts because 0:13:44.640 --> 0:13:47.880 it's it's about the corner, like the stand up. It 0:13:47.880 --> 0:13:51.520 has become Adam Sandler. Yeah, it has surpassed its humanity. 0:13:52.200 --> 0:13:55.640 But yeah, so there's nothing wrong with individual AI projects, 0:13:55.679 --> 0:13:58.560 Lannier says, In fact, he has worked on them himself. 0:13:58.760 --> 0:14:00.640 But he makes a couple of point points. He says, 0:14:01.120 --> 0:14:05.680 individual advances in artificial intelligence research can be interpreted more 0:14:05.800 --> 0:14:09.800 usefully without the overall framework of AI meaning without the 0:14:09.840 --> 0:14:14.800 idea that computers are becoming synthetic versions of human intelligence. 0:14:15.240 --> 0:14:17.840 And the example he gives is, you know, the IBM 0:14:17.920 --> 0:14:21.000 computer winning on Jeopardy, Watson going on, they're beating people 0:14:21.000 --> 0:14:23.840 on Jeopardy. So he he says, that's a theatrical stunt 0:14:24.400 --> 0:14:28.320 that over sells a fake aspect of what this computer 0:14:28.400 --> 0:14:31.600 program can do, you know, conversational human knowledge, which it 0:14:31.640 --> 0:14:36.120 doesn't really have, and under sells a real aspect of 0:14:36.120 --> 0:14:39.760 its capabilities that it's a very powerful phrase based search engine. 0:14:40.920 --> 0:14:44.880 And then he also says that AI, uh, that the 0:14:44.960 --> 0:14:48.840 AI that in some way passes for human requires humans 0:14:48.880 --> 0:14:50.800 to do all the work, Like when you've got a 0:14:50.840 --> 0:14:54.120 social robot, you know, going around saying like Hi, I'm 0:14:54.160 --> 0:14:57.040 your friendly social robot. Look at how advanced my artificial 0:14:57.080 --> 0:15:00.760 intelligence is. His point is that humans be being social, 0:15:00.880 --> 0:15:03.040 will work with what they get. And if you're having 0:15:03.040 --> 0:15:05.960 a transaction with a robot that you are told is 0:15:06.040 --> 0:15:09.120 social in nature, you can very easily adapt your social 0:15:09.120 --> 0:15:13.000 behaviors to the extreme limitations of this machine, and they 0:15:13.080 --> 0:15:15.520 do tend to be pretty extreme. You're not going to 0:15:15.680 --> 0:15:18.920 mistake at a machine for a human. Yeah, I mean, 0:15:18.960 --> 0:15:21.640 as we've discussed on the show before. I mean humans 0:15:21.640 --> 0:15:24.720 can have we can have conversations with with a with 0:15:24.800 --> 0:15:27.880 a doll, with a with a smiley face. It's scrawled 0:15:27.880 --> 0:15:31.320 on the wall and in putting. So, uh, it's not 0:15:31.400 --> 0:15:33.080 that much of a step to say that, yes, we 0:15:33.120 --> 0:15:35.520 can have a conversation with a chat bot. We can, 0:15:35.600 --> 0:15:38.120 we can have a conversation with a search engine, and 0:15:38.160 --> 0:15:40.360 of course we can certainly have a conversation with an 0:15:40.360 --> 0:15:42.800 echo borg. How often, though, do you meet a person 0:15:42.880 --> 0:15:47.680 who really loves fruit trees? That's true, I love fruit trees. 0:15:48.480 --> 0:15:50.440 I hate fruit trees. But how can you hate fruit 0:15:50.440 --> 0:15:52.560 trees because I'm not a robot? What would you do 0:15:52.560 --> 0:15:54.320 if you found a turtle the turtles on its back? 0:15:54.360 --> 0:15:56.520 Why aren't you turning him over? Joe? But what what? 0:15:56.520 --> 0:16:00.560 What I'll tell you about my mother? Okay? Sorry? So 0:16:00.720 --> 0:16:03.720 but anyway, A lawyer goes on to say, quote, what 0:16:03.880 --> 0:16:05.880 bothers me about this trend? And he's talking about this 0:16:05.920 --> 0:16:10.760 AI media trend. However, is that by allowing artificial intelligence 0:16:10.800 --> 0:16:15.240 to reshape our concept of personhood, we're leaving ourselves opened 0:16:15.240 --> 0:16:18.400 to the flip side. We think of people more and 0:16:18.440 --> 0:16:22.080 more as computers, just as we think of computers as people, 0:16:22.880 --> 0:16:25.240 and I think there might be something to that, actually, 0:16:25.440 --> 0:16:28.440 that the idea of AI not only sort of lifts 0:16:28.680 --> 0:16:32.920 computers up, but in a certain way, at least emotionally, 0:16:33.120 --> 0:16:38.400 kind of lowers humans down. Yeah. And we we've discussed this, 0:16:38.440 --> 0:16:41.160 I feel recently on the show too, about how just 0:16:42.280 --> 0:16:46.560 even though we we have this increasingly pervasive model of 0:16:46.600 --> 0:16:50.480 our own cognitive performance as being essentially a program, we 0:16:50.480 --> 0:16:54.400 think about processing things, we think about visual input of data, 0:16:54.520 --> 0:16:57.760 we think about crunching the numbers. Uh, and in various 0:16:57.760 --> 0:17:02.480 other models we use technology g to inform our understanding 0:17:02.520 --> 0:17:05.239 of how our brains are working. And those are just 0:17:05.640 --> 0:17:08.680 those are just metaphors really, and but the underlying processes 0:17:08.720 --> 0:17:13.159 are not really comparable to the computers that we have today. 0:17:13.160 --> 0:17:16.000 It would be we could maybe compare them to an 0:17:16.040 --> 0:17:18.199 advanced computer will haveing in the future, some sort of 0:17:18.359 --> 0:17:24.280 maybe um you know, um advanced machine maybe. Yeah. Yeah, 0:17:24.480 --> 0:17:27.760 I think that's true. Uh, They're they're very much metaphors. 0:17:28.440 --> 0:17:30.720 And I'm not saying that they're not useful metaphors. But 0:17:30.840 --> 0:17:32.959 I do think I want to take what Landing are 0:17:32.960 --> 0:17:36.119 saying seriously here, because I think he has a point Anyway, 0:17:36.160 --> 0:17:38.800 he goes on when he's going to get to the singularity, 0:17:38.840 --> 0:17:42.320 so he says, you know, engineers are humans with human desires, 0:17:42.359 --> 0:17:45.520 even though they may be advocating this sort of like 0:17:45.640 --> 0:17:50.800 dehumanized technological ideology or view of intelligence in personhood in 0:17:50.840 --> 0:17:53.280 the world, and they've got the same desires that lead 0:17:53.359 --> 0:17:56.520 us to create and follow religions. So this sort of 0:17:56.640 --> 0:18:01.000 leads them to wrap their technological ideologies up into parallels 0:18:01.000 --> 0:18:04.679 of religious thinking. And he and according to Lannier, he 0:18:04.720 --> 0:18:08.679 thinks the concept of the singularity is a religion expressed 0:18:08.680 --> 0:18:13.440 through engineering culture. And he points out if this religion entails, 0:18:13.560 --> 0:18:18.639 you know, essentially scatological beliefs that imply that most people, basically, 0:18:18.680 --> 0:18:22.560 I would say, anybody not working in information theory, artificial intelligence, 0:18:22.640 --> 0:18:26.360 or robotics, if pretty much anybody outside those fields can 0:18:26.400 --> 0:18:30.679 basically just sit and wait for imminent salvation or destruction 0:18:31.080 --> 0:18:36.400 via the machines. And if inadvertent devaluation of persons by 0:18:36.440 --> 0:18:41.000 overstating analogies between persons and computers takes place, it can 0:18:41.040 --> 0:18:46.560 certainly exacerbate tensions between traditional religions and modernity, and it 0:18:46.600 --> 0:18:51.960 can be a destructive and demoralizing force in itself. So anyway, 0:18:52.119 --> 0:18:54.840 he ends by saying technology best serves humanity when we 0:18:54.920 --> 0:18:58.560 resist the urge to turn it into a religious ideology. Yeah, 0:18:58.600 --> 0:19:00.760 because otherwise you ended up in a situation where you're like, 0:19:01.200 --> 0:19:04.520 I could, I could exercise and eat right, But singularities 0:19:04.600 --> 0:19:07.359 come in. Singularities gonna work that out, or you might think, 0:19:07.560 --> 0:19:10.119 I'm not even gonna bother to write the Great American novel, 0:19:10.240 --> 0:19:15.119 because Great American Novel bought thirty seven oh five. It's 0:19:15.119 --> 0:19:17.280 gonna write the Great American novel. It's gonna write one 0:19:17.440 --> 0:19:21.120 a day, one every hour. Yeah. I I could work 0:19:21.160 --> 0:19:24.679 hard to achieve peace in world civilization, but maybe the 0:19:24.720 --> 0:19:27.560 Ai'll sort it all out for this or just kill 0:19:27.640 --> 0:19:30.840 us all. I mean, either one. It's sort of a demoralizing, 0:19:30.920 --> 0:19:36.000 de motivating belief, which of course has obvious parallels with 0:19:36.800 --> 0:19:41.480 you know, more apocalyptic near future um religious movements that 0:19:41.560 --> 0:19:44.879 said the end time is coming. So what does it 0:19:45.000 --> 0:19:48.040 matter giving your money now? Certainly? Yeah, what whether it's 0:19:48.119 --> 0:19:52.240 a secular or you know, supernatural or not supernatural in nature? 0:19:52.240 --> 0:19:55.560 If you've got beliefs about a powerful force that comes 0:19:55.560 --> 0:19:58.480 in and intervenes and makes all of our actions obsolete 0:19:58.600 --> 0:20:01.520 either either way it comes from. Uh that seems like 0:20:01.560 --> 0:20:04.400 it can have a de motivating force on the way 0:20:04.400 --> 0:20:07.240 you live your life. But I want to say one 0:20:07.240 --> 0:20:09.480 more thing Linear says about the Singularity that I think 0:20:09.560 --> 0:20:12.320 is interesting. Uh So, I listened to a podcast that 0:20:12.440 --> 0:20:15.320 was an interview with Linear and and he says, quote, 0:20:15.720 --> 0:20:19.040 the difference between a religious fanatic and a religious non 0:20:19.080 --> 0:20:23.600 fanatic is in the certainty of the imminent timing of 0:20:23.640 --> 0:20:26.520 whatever their scatan is, you know, whatever their end of 0:20:26.600 --> 0:20:30.159 days is. It's when you believe that you know when 0:20:30.240 --> 0:20:33.400 it's happening and it's soon that you really turn into 0:20:33.400 --> 0:20:36.000 a nutcase and you do harm to yourself and others. 0:20:36.280 --> 0:20:39.440 In my mind, the Singularity movement is sort of doing that. 0:20:40.240 --> 0:20:42.000 And I think I see what he's saying there, because 0:20:42.040 --> 0:20:44.560 he sort of qualifies saying that if you mean, in 0:20:44.600 --> 0:20:48.719 the very long term view, humanity will make some phase 0:20:48.800 --> 0:20:52.640 transition and it has something to do with information technology 0:20:52.760 --> 0:20:55.560 that's not necessarily crazy or harmful. You know, you might say, 0:20:55.640 --> 0:20:57.879 who knows, over the next few thousands of years, some 0:20:58.040 --> 0:21:03.919 somehow humanity might change itself due to computers and the 0:21:03.960 --> 0:21:06.439 Internet and stuff like that. But the notion that it's 0:21:06.440 --> 0:21:09.560 going to happen in twenty years or something is destructive 0:21:09.640 --> 0:21:13.359 and a sign of fanaticism, according to him, And I 0:21:13.400 --> 0:21:16.439 think that that idea makes sense to me too. Well, 0:21:17.280 --> 0:21:19.359 in large part, you could say, you're you're setting yourself 0:21:19.400 --> 0:21:22.520 up for disappointment, You're setting yourself up to fail right, 0:21:22.760 --> 0:21:25.959 that you're going to reach that point when the second 0:21:25.960 --> 0:21:27.879 Coming is going to happen, when the Singularity is going 0:21:27.920 --> 0:21:31.840 to happen, and it doesn't happen, and then how do 0:21:31.920 --> 0:21:34.080 you feel about the world. Then how do you approach 0:21:34.240 --> 0:21:36.320 the near and long term future? Well, I think that 0:21:36.440 --> 0:21:38.639 is definitely something we should talk about in just a moment. 0:21:38.640 --> 0:21:40.560 But I want to finish up on the Singularity with 0:21:40.600 --> 0:21:42.920 one or two more things. First of all, I want 0:21:42.920 --> 0:21:45.160 to go back and defend against that by saying, there 0:21:45.160 --> 0:21:47.160 are also people who say, you know, look, if we're 0:21:47.160 --> 0:21:50.320 worried about the Ai Ragnarok uh saying that AI is 0:21:50.320 --> 0:21:52.679 going to come in and destroy us, all we do 0:21:52.800 --> 0:21:55.200 need to be thinking about it now. Even if it's 0:21:55.200 --> 0:21:57.960 not going to happen soon. Just the possibility that it 0:21:58.080 --> 0:22:01.880 might happen soon means that we need to be preparing immediately. 0:22:02.760 --> 0:22:05.120 I can see the wisdom in that too. I mean, 0:22:05.640 --> 0:22:08.600 I don't know. It's Uh. At the risk of sounding 0:22:08.640 --> 0:22:12.800 fascil I, I see both sides. Yeah, well, I mean, certainly, uh, 0:22:13.920 --> 0:22:16.159 if the iceberg is out there, we want to know 0:22:16.240 --> 0:22:19.720 how not to run the ship into it. But then again, 0:22:19.800 --> 0:22:22.240 but what if the iceberg is a superhuman robot that 0:22:22.280 --> 0:22:25.760 you don't even know whether it could possibly exist or not. Well, 0:22:26.359 --> 0:22:29.520 that's the kind of thinking that it enables humanity time 0:22:29.520 --> 0:22:33.480 and time again to not actually, you know, deal with 0:22:33.480 --> 0:22:36.080 the problems that are facing them, to just say, ah, 0:22:36.240 --> 0:22:38.840 it might not even be real. So I don't know. 0:22:38.880 --> 0:22:49.959 The jury is still out on the science there. So 0:22:50.000 --> 0:22:52.840 I want to offer one more thing, the impossible defense 0:22:52.880 --> 0:22:56.240 of singularity thinking. I found a short video on YouTube 0:22:57.160 --> 0:23:00.080 where somebody in a crowd asks Ray Kurzweil himself, the 0:23:00.119 --> 0:23:03.640 guy who said it's going to happen if the Singularity 0:23:03.720 --> 0:23:08.320 is a religion, and Kerswill responds that. He says, essentially, 0:23:08.320 --> 0:23:10.840 it does provide some of the same things that religion 0:23:10.880 --> 0:23:14.280 traditionally provided, like a means to forestall death. That's worth 0:23:14.320 --> 0:23:18.520